The Righteous Path of the Analyst

Is being an analyst a "way-station" to a job at a vendor, as Thomas posits in this post? Are all of us analyst types just "marketers in training?" I can't speak for everyone, but I've already been the senior marketing exec for $50-70 million dollar vendors, so there is no training involved. I pretty much hated doing marketing for a living, so that's where I'm at.

But let me provide a bit of context as to what analysts do when they decide to grow up. Back in the old days, you know - 1998, there were basically two paths for an analyst to take once established:

1. Wall Street - This was when being a Wall Street analyst was cool. Write some research, glad hand with some vendors preparing for their IPO, talk to some investors - walk away with 7 figures a year. Those were the good old days, that's for sure. But this was definitely one of the places to go for an industry analyst. I danced with that devil many times. This isn't really the case anymore because there's been a huge amount of consolidation at the i-banks and being a Wall Street analyst may be more thankless than being a CSO.
   
   
2. Vendor-land - Lots of analysts (yours truly) ended up starting companies back in the late 90's during the Bubble. Board seats, big titles like EVP, it was cool. A few years earlier ('92-'97), analysts would predominately be product managers or maybe product marketing. It was very hard for an analyst to get a VP title, especially if they hadn't ever had an operational job. The late 90's changed that, but only for a few years.

So what does a guy like me do next? Thomas is right, it's mostly go to vendors. Some take marketing roles (like Stiennon), others take CTO or strategy roles (like Amrit), others are product managers/marketers (like my old META colleagues David Thompson and Chris King). Very few go the route of the user, that's pretty hard work and the money is pretty crappy (relative to the dream of vendor equity anyway).

But I'm not really answering the question, now am I? is it just a breeding ground for marketers? I guess for some. The skills you develop as an analyst are pretty leveragable as a vendor. Folks at the G (and formerly at META and maybe even Forrester) learn to think like a user. That's pretty helpful. They also learn about positioning and telling a compelling story. They are very comfortable in front of people, both speaking and advising. They have lots of contacts with end users (for the end user oriented analysts anyway). And they also have an "air" of credibility. For the first week they work for a vendor anyway.

Yet, analysts with no operational experience get WAY over their head very quickly if they own the entire marketing job. What the hell does an analyst know about lead generation or advertising or working with the channel or the cost of sales of building a product? Not a hell of a lot, that's what. I had to learn a lot (A LOT) on the job. Thankfully I worked with a friend and mentor that taught me and was cool that I basically didn't know anything.

Former analysts also lose their credibility incredibly quickly as well. You are not objective by any stretch of the imagination if a vendor is paying your salary. Even if you are brought in to "advise" a user, your answer better be to roll out lots of whatever the company you work for sells.

Most CEO's don't get that when they hire an analyst into a marketing role. They figure they'll just do marketing and the end users will think they are great and buy whatever it is they say. Not so much. That's why being a vendor turns out to be a nightmare for lots of ex-analystas. They are just unprepared to do the job and end up hating many of the mind-numbingly tedious parts of marketing.

But lots of them need to learn this the hard way. I know I did. Analysts leave what is admittedly a pretty cushy job because they want to do something else. They can't envision themselves as an analyst lifer. They want to "do something" and take an active role in creating markets. And the idea of a C or VP in their title is very compelling.

Yet, I don't think any analyst goes into the job with the clear intention to join a vendor sooner rather than later. They say about M&A, "company's are bought, not sold." Well, the same goes for analysts. Only if they are good and become fairly well known do the vendors fawn over them and basically offer them jobs all the time. It still happens to me (even though I make it clear that I'm not interested). But this does not happen just because you have a G on your business card.

Since it's pretty unlikely that successful analysts are looking to be picked up by a vendor, how is this a conflict of interest? I don't understand that part of Thomas' argument. Basically, if you whore for one vendor, you better hope they pick you up - because you aren't going to have a lot of friends at the other vendors. If these analysts whore for all the vendors, then they are just whores and getting out of bed presents a conflict of interest for them. That is the same regardless of whether they are looking for a job or not.

My position is pretty clear. I work on behalf of users and have absolutely no intention of going back into vendor-land. I can't say I'll be a security analyst for the rest of my working life, but I can tell you it's very very very very very very unlikely that I'd ever be a VP Marketing again.

Is that clear enough Thomas?